Am I Really That Naive?

I'm going to say its a No, but not far from it. I didnt fall for either of the two fraud attempts to pass my plate in the last two days. Yeah, Seriously two in two days. But I almost did!

So I recently signed up for a EIN, in doing so I discussed what options were available to me as currently my main source of photography income (not quite) but where the money is coming from in relationship to photography is from the MNSCS. Because the MNSCS is working towards non profit status, there are some options for me here as well as a 501 (C) 3a status due to supporting a national sporting event ( a little far fetched, but some of the races are national qualifiers. Anyways, they were just conversations.

Well that same day I get this:

From:
"Internal Revenue Service"service@irs.gov

Subject:
Get Tax Refund !

Date:
Monday, September 15, 2008 5:36:27 AM

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activitywe have determined that you are eligible to receivea tax refund under section 501(c) (3) of theInternal Revenue Code. Tax refund value is $620.50. Please submit the tax refund request and allow us 6-9 daysin order to IWP the data received.If u don't receive your refund within 9 businessdays from the original IRS mailing date shown,you can start a refund trace online.
If you distribute funds to other organization, your records must show wetherthey are exempt under section 497 (c) (15). In cases where the recipient org.is not exempt under section 497 (c) (15), you must have evidence the funds willbe used for section 497 (c) (15) purposes.If you distribute fund to individuals, you should keep case histories showingthe recipient's name and address; the purpose of the award; the maner ofsection; and the realtionship of the recipient to any of your officers, directors,trustees, members, or major contributors.
To access the form for your tax refund, please click hereThis notification has been sent by the Internal Revenue Service,a bureau of the Department of the Treasury.


So, I am skeptical right away because, Duh, like I just all of a sudden am going to get an email from the IRS saying, "Here, we want to give you some money" But because of my (only hours before) conversation with the IRS I thought maybe they looked into it and for some reason I am eligible for some sort of refund because technically my business started at the beginning of the year.

Well, I click on the "click here" link, looks ligit so I fill in some information, then hit next. Now they want my bank account information, pin number, confirmation code on the back of my debit card and financial information for my Bank. Yea right, Sorry IRS I am not even going to give you that information. If you want it I bet you can figure it out yourselves.

So needless to say, I deleted the email, called the IRS again. 15 minutes on hold, explained the email, they had me forward it to a fraud department then contacted my bank just to let them know nothing was submitted but that the email was out there.


Incident # 2:

I am selling my Nikon as everyone knows and if you dont please see below. : )
So I posted it on Ebay. I have never sold anything on Ebay before but thought it would be a good opportunity/item to try it out.

Within the first day (should have been a red flag) I got an email from a gentlemen asking me if I would be willing to stop the sale and he would pay me $150 more then I was asking because I would need to send the camera over seas and he knew thats approx what the cost would be.

I looked at the ebayers record and he had 100% customer feedback but only 5 purchases under his belt. I thought, okay seems alittle fishy. Whats the saying. "If it appears too good to be true then it probably is" is what kept going through my mind. But I thought, I will give the guy the benefit of the doubt and pull my item. He asked me to send him a request for payment through Paypal. Which I did.

After a few hours I got a confirmation email from Paypal stating that they had recieved the funds from the client and that they would hold them until a shipping/tracking number could be provided to ensure the best experience for both parties in the transaction.

The email was spot on! Looked ALMOST exactly like all the other emails I have ever gotten from Paypal.

Then I receive an email from the "Buyer" Providing me with the address to send the item to and that it was a gift for his daughter and If I could please send the package out by 9/17/08. I am thinking "ohhhh how sweet, and what a lucky girl" until I see that the shipping address is in Nigeria.

Everything that I have read about fraud on Ebay involves Nigeria and Kenya as the two countries so I was alittle uncomfortable, but I thought to myself, "Paypal had confirmed the funds and the guy had a verified account" which I remember thinking was odd. Just didnt think things were going that great in Nigeria.

I called Andy to see if he would mail out the package for me, Thankfully he said he didnt feel comfortable because he wasnt sure what should/should not go in the package. We looked up the currency exchange. Dude would have to pay me over $100,000 niara for the camera.

Okay, things are definately getting smellier.

Doodlidoo Doodilidoo Doodilidoo Now its morning time today.

Go into work an hour late to gather everything, bring to post office, buy box, tape, packaging material. Wrap everything up, fill out customs information and paperwork and go up to the counter and say to the guy. "I cant send this right now, just the packaging material" He looks at me kind of odd and asks, "why not?"

I proceed to tell him that it was my first time selling something on ebay and that its just not right, my whole body is telling me not to send out the package, and that its supposed to go to Nigeria which would cost approx $100 to ship.

He says that he sells lots of stuff through ebay and that if its going to Nigeria I SHOULD be concerned. He asked if I had gotten the payment. I say, "yes, it went through paypal. It even said he was verified." Mailman Sighs relief, says, "okay that should be okay," then ?!? "Unless they have tampered with paypal."

Well I didnt even think of that. So I leave with my package, the mailman says if they want a tracking number I can give them the one on the top of my form to see if payment goes through. (I am thinking, sweet! Thank God for this mailman!)

Get to work, log on to paypal, spend 15 minutes figuring out how to call them, they really like hiding their phone number. Get a women on the line. Ask if I have any payments in a hold status. She confirms what I already knew. NOOOOOOOO!

She tells me that I have a request outstanding but that the email address does not show to have a corresponding paypal account. She verifies that I didnt send out the package. I say, "No"

She then tells me to check the history of my Paypal status. It will always say "funds pending waiting shipping detail" or something similar. I tried to report the fraud to her but she didnt have a clue, just kept telling me to wait until tomorrow because maybe the payment would then go through. I explained that I already got a confirmation email from paypal saying that the funds were there and that I thought It was fraudulent and she just said "the payment will go through"

I said, "how long does it usually take for a payment to show" She says, "a matter of minutes" HELLO LADY, I GOT THE CONFIRMATION EMAIL YESTERDAY.

She still tells me to wait for the payment. I hang up frustrated, find the security center. Submit the emails to the security center, get a response back in a matter of minutes stating that the emails were not legit, they were blocking users and disassembling corresponding sites or something to that affect.

I had emailed the "buyer" stating that my Paypal account did not show the funds on hold and that Paypal had assured me it would be posted by the following day if the funds were in deed on hold.

I then got another email from the so called "buyer" playing "Paypal" Which I found to be quite hilarious actually.

"Dear dana schoppe,

We are pleased to get back to you in response to transaction between you and our client. We are pleased to inform you that this transaction is safe and secure. This is to inform you that funds has been deducted from the buyer's PayPal account for the item sold to our client, which is currently pending with us for security purpose. We hereby request you by all means to get the item shipped as the money has been deducted from our client Janina Janes PayPal account and can not be refund back. The said amount will be credited into your PayPal account as soon as we can verify the shipment tracking number of the item. So we request you to ship out the item within the next 24hours of receiving this mail via USPS and and get back to us with the shipment tracking number for verification and confirmation of the shipment, so that PayPal can credit your account as soon as they have verify the shipment details. We give you a 100% assurance that once the proof of the postage has been received from you, we shall get the funds credited into your PayPal Account with immediate effect. Due to PayPal new policy, This security measure is taking due to too many complaints we are receiving from buyers and more also to secure the seller also the buyer on a legal transaction.Failure to comply will lead to LEGAL ACTION. For security purpose, item only needs to be shipped to the address in the payment confirmation email we sent to you through USPS Express Mail® International 8 day shipping in other to be cover by PayPal Seller Protection Policy Programme. We are very sorry for any inconveniences these may or might have caused in any way."

Umm, I dont know when paypal stopped using spell check and had issues with grammar but this was definately a desperate attempt, and it came perfectly timed, 3 minutes after the Deuschbag responded to my email stating that I had better send out the package or he will give me negative rep points on ebay. What a threat!! Plus Paypal had no clue on the USPS option of shipping.

I respond to him "Deuschbag" that I have received confirmation that his emails are phony, have reported him to both ebay and paypal and to no longer contact me.

It tis the End of the story. Hopefully, he hasnt contacted me again. Im out the $12 listing fee on ebay and all the time wasted dinking around with the dink but Atleast I didnt get hosed.

Now that I thoroughly look like an Idiot, I hope all you people can learn from this and avoid all these scams. Had I been a sweet little non skeptical lady I totally would have sent out my package to the ebay guy and not given it a second thought.